Venn Diagram
by Bridgetinerabbit
Summary: Against her better judgement, Marinette worries she doesn't quite measure up to her super persona in Adrien's eyes. Adrien lays out in no uncertain terms why that's just not true. Post reveal, post relationship fluff.


"And that was the last one!" Marinette closed her math book with a loud thud as Adrien started packing his books from her desk into his bags. Lately they'd been spending their days after school in her room, doing their homework together and eating pastries. "So it looks like there's plenty of time for a few rounds of UMS III or maybe a couple of episodes of something."

While Marinette busied herself with narrowing down options for their next activity, Adrien noticed her body language was a little stiff. When she looked at him she was smiling, but it looked slightly forced. Adrien shook his head and said, "Okay, what's bothering you?"

"Ugh, it's really nothing."

"It's clearly not."

"Well it should be! God this is so stupid."

Adrien made himself comfortable on the desk chair and waited for her to continue.

Marinette began pacing and gesturing with her hands, "Okay, so, we've been doing this, 'knowing the identities' thing and the 'being together' thing for a couple of weeks now, and everything's great, and I know you think I'm wonderful as 'Marinette', and I totally know that it's true, but sometimes, when I let my brain wander a little too far, I start to worry that, well..." she ducked her head and mumbled, "maybe you still like me as 'Ladybug' better." Lifting her head, she half shouted, "Even though, logically, I know that's completely stupid!"

Adrien's eyes shot wide. He looked down and frowned in thought, and then grinned up at her and chuckled, "You're right, that is stupid."

Marinette threw her hands up in exasperation and shouted, "I know!" However, her posture did seem to relax slightly at having heard him say that. Not enough, though.

Adrien tapped his chin and said, "Okay, so apparently this completely false idea isn't going to just leave you alone, so we need to put it to rest once and for all." He spun the chair to face the desk, grabbed a discarded page from an earlier sketch, a pencil, and the nearest textbook. "So I am going to demonstrate to you," he swiveled around, clasped Marinette's hand and headed for the chaise lounge, "that not only do I NOT like Ladybug more, but - !" He plopped down, dragging her with him. They landed so they sat side by side, her fingers intertwined with his in his left hand. He put the text book on his lap and the discarded sketch face down on top of it. "I actually like Marinette better," he finished with a toothy grin.

Marinette blinked at him with a perplexed look. "Okay, that makes no sense. 'Ladybug' is literally everything that 'Marinette' is, but with superpowers. I'll buy that you like them... us? me... the same, but liking Marinette better than Ladybug makes no logical sense."

Adrien used his free hand to squeeze her forearm, "That's where you're wrong, princess! And I'll prove it with a Venn diagram." Then he grabbed the pencil and drew two large overlapping circles.

Marinette muttered, "Of course you would use something like a Venn diagram."

Ignoring her comment, Adrien started, "So, over here in the right section are all of the attributes that are exclusive to Ladybug, in the middle, is the section for shared attributes, and on the left is everything that's just Marinette and not Ladybug." Adrien looked up at Marinette. "Now, before we begin, you do understand, logically at least that when I look at you, I see Marinette all the time, right? I mean, at first it was a little bit weird to adjust, but since then, you're always either Marinette, or Marinette in polka dots with power ups."

Marinette quirked her mouth and replied, "Yes, logically I know that you see me as one person, even though there was an adjustment period, and it was much the same for me with you."

Adrien nodded. "And so even though you originally fell for the charming boy next door, or... a couple of blocks away anyway, you don't see the mysterious and roguish hero as somehow lesser, because I know you also always see 'us' as me. Right?"

Marinette snorted and rolled her eyes, but couldn't quite hide her grin, "Of course, kitty. It's all always you." She poked him in the ribs. "The same inflated ego and everything. Though, somehow Chat Noir still has all the pet names. Huh."

"Not all of them." Adrien mumbled to himself.

"What was that, Chaton?"

Adrien flashed his winningest smile, "Oh nothing, Hot Stuff."

Marinette shoved him while he cackled before burying her face in her hands. "Oh my God Alya! I'm gonna kill her!"

Adrien did his best to compose himself while a few giggles slipped through. "Okay, we got off track." He grabbed her hand again and gave it a quick kiss before wrapping her arm into his so he could use her clasped hand as a prop for his cheek, as he gestured to the center section of the diagram. "So basically, your whole personality belongs in this middle section, because, while you do act some differently, the essence of your personality doesn't change when you don the suit." Adrien jotted 'whole personality' in the middle section while Marinette looked at him skeptically. He continued, "No really, when you're Ladybug, your personality is the same, you've just always got your game face on." He scribbled 'perpetual game face' in the rightmost section. "While Marinette, exclusive of Ladybug, has better access to your other faces, like sleepy relaxed face, which is among my favorites." He added it to the leftmost section. "But Ladybug does not have exclusive rights to the Marinette Dupain-Cheng game face, which is a sight to behold, whether directed at an akuma or Chloe, so it goes in the middle, as a non-perpetual option."

Marinette looked thoughtfully at this odd parsing of her personality. "Okay, I guess I can see that. But then there's also the superpowers."

"Right you are!" Adrien exclaimed while he absentmindedly rubbed a circle on the back of her hand. "So here we go, on the Ladybug exclusive side," He pens as he speaks, "Can lift a car." He tapped the pen to his chin and considered, "Oh! There's that crazy Cats Cradle-like thing you do between lamp posts and stuff when something needs catching." He carefully wrote 'mad yoyo skillz'. "How are you at yoyos without the suit anyway?"

Marinette shot him a puzzled look. "What? I don't know. The last time I picked up a regular yoyo was against Simon Says, and I was Ladybug at the time, so I don't think that counts."

"Doesn't it though?"

"No, it doesn't, I'm a klutz when I'm not Ladybug"

"Ooh, right. I forgot that one" Adrien jotted in the Ladybug section 'basic coordination'.

Marinette slapped his arm with her free hand, "Oh shut up."

Adrien grinned at her. "What? I think it's cute. Oh, but that does bring up another thing." Adrien wrote, 'creates random polka dotted items from thin air.'

Marinette frowned. "They're not random. It's all part of the Ladybug thing. I get the lucky charm and then figure out how to use it to solve whatever problem I'm encountering."

Adrien smirked and raised an eyebrow. "Are you saying that you don't come up with scathingly brilliant plans that may or may not be ridiculously convoluted when you're not being Ladybug?" Marinette eyed him warily, but seemed unsure how to respond. He continued with the most smug grin he could muster, "What about, 'Operation: Secret Garden?'"

Marinette shouted, "ALYA IS SO DEAD!" as she tackled a laughing Adrien to the floor, grabbed a nearby pillow, and beat him with it as soundly as a detransformed superheroine could.

Adrien blocked as well as he could while trying to catch a breath through his own laughter. Between gasps he said, "And then… when I invited you for a ride… you said... NO!" His face went purple with the force of his laughter.

Marinette yelled, "Shut it, Buttercup!!" while she beat him with renewed vigor.

Between breaths Adrien responded, "Oh look, another pet name!" and gave up speaking to his fit of giggles.

Marinette threw the pillow down, face planted onto it, and yelled into the pillow, "You are the worst!!"

As Adrien calmed down from his giggle high, he breathed, "God I love you."

Marinette lifted her face from the pillow and scowled at him. "I love you too, but I thought this exercise was supposed to be about making me feel better."

Adrien cleared his throat, and failed to wipe the stupid grin off his face. "You're right. We got side tracked." He got up, walked over to Marinette and offered his hand, "My Lady?" She huffed as she took the offered hand and he immediately re-twined their fingers and escorted her back to the chaise lounge where they resettled. "So, the only thing I see missing from the Ladybug side is admittedly pretty cool, and that is your magical reset button."

Marinette snickered. "You mean 'Miraculous Ladybug?'"

"Yeah, that. Now, moving on to my favorite section, the Marinette exclusive of Ladybug section."

Marinette still seemed unconvinced. "Aside from 'sleepy relaxed face' what could possibly go there?"

Adrien looked her in the eye and raised an eyebrow before he silently jotted down, 'can hang out in public.' "Marinette is a whole lot easier to date."

"Okay, that's actually a pretty good point."

"Oh, and add to that," he wrote, 'is close friends with my close friends.' "I mean, this whole having friends thing is still a pretty big deal for me, so having this relationship with you when Nino and Alya are already so close to both of us, it's just… really nice."

Marinette smiled. "Okay, yeah, I guess that's pretty special."

"And then," Adrien announced as he absentmindedly ran little circular patterns on her wrist, "There's one final thing that Marinette has that Ladybug does not." He put the diagram down and turned to face her directly, and grabbed her hand in both of his in the process. "This thing that Ladybug sorely lacks is easily ten times better than all the magical powers combined and frankly puts every last polka dotted trinket and yoyo trick to shame. This is the thing that makes me certain that I like Marinette more than Ladybug, without any doubt whatsoever."

Marinette giggled, "Alright! Out with it, what do I have that's so special that Ladybug doesn't?"

Adrien lifted her hand up to his lips and breathed one word before lightly kissing her knuckles, "Skin."

Marinette squeaked as her face turned the shade of her purse.


End file.
